Award: OCE-1807143

Hurricanes may have severe impacts on both human and natural coastal communities. This award provided us with the opportunity to measure the ways a major storm, Hurricane Harvey, reshaped coastal seagrass habitats in Texas. We documented severe, but localized, impacts of the hurricane on seagrass habitats in Corpus Christi and Aransas Bays. These impacts included patchy, but significant losses in seagrass cover in areas that experienced the strongest winds. Most of the negative impacts of the Hurricane seem to be driven by the physical damage caused by winds and storm surge, rather than the effects of rainfall and nutrient run-off in this area. Interestingly, we observed that seagrasses grew very fast at sites that experienced more freshwater run-off after the storm. This was likely caused by higher nutrient levels in the water for longer time periods at these sites. This may have helped seagrass recover more quickly after the hurricane in places where the roots were not damaged. In places where damage to the below ground tissues occurred (e.g. loss and uprooting of roots and rhizomes), we expect that seagrass recovery will take much longer. At sites where seagrasses were damaged, we found different types of animal communities compared to less disturbed sites, although not a lower number or biodiversity of animals. The types of fauna living at the study sites varied greatly throughout the year. We believe impacts on fauna may have occurred at different scales (in space or time) than we surveyed, and caution that lack of long-term data on seagrass fauna make the true effects of the hurricane difficult to detect. In comparing impacts of the Hurricane Harvey on seagrasses to impacts in other coastal ecosystems, it appears that seagrasses were relatively resistant to the storm (did not show as large of changes from the pre-storm baseline) when compared to other variables. Seagrasses may be less resilient, however, as recovery times (months to years) for areas that were damaged is expected to be much longer than for other habitats or systems (e.g., freshwater streams). This award had many positive impacts on students ranging from the K-12 to PhD level. Research for one PhD and one Master’s students’ theses were funded in part by this award. Also, five undergraduate students were trained in research techniques in the lab and in the marine environment. The results of this project were also used to build a high-school level science lesson. This lesson taught about how seagrass health is tracked, how the hurricane impacted seagrasses in Texas, and valuable map reading skills. This lesson plan was delivered to 15 local teachers in a summer teacher workshop. Last Modified: 04/01/2020 Submitted by: Lauren Yeager